It’s phenomenal. The writing, performances, recording and sequences of these songs are reckless, ambitious, tossed off with an air of “whatever,” and 100% flawed in the most pure, midwestern way possible.

Midnight Reruns was cooked up by its singer-songwriter, Graham Hunt (ex-member of Trapper Schoepp & The Shades, another great Milwaukee band), at The Midwest Sound in Rockford, IL. It’s an amazing American-made pizza loaded with flavor that my tender body had been missing in a ballsy rock record for quite some time. #PIZZA!

Jonathan Wilson – FanfarePaesanos Restaurant in Rockford, IL, used to make the best pan pizza in town, if not the entire United States of America. It was located on the west side of town near St. Peter’s Cathedral Church, across from the Nihan & Martin Drugstore where I used to buy candy and baseball cards as a kid. The city of Rockford decided to work on the intersection of Auburn St. and Main St. in the early 2000s, which halted and closed many of the businesses located at the intersection. Paesanos was one of many that had been open for two decades plus that suffered from the city’s negligences to pay their bills to the construction companies working on the intersection’s upgrades.

A few seasons went by and the construction lasted about 10 months longer than it should have, which forced many businesses to recover, sell, or close. Paesanos sold their business due to this delay in construction to a family nephew of theirs who they taught how to cook the pizza.

The pizza was incredible upon their reopening–the best fucking pizza I have ever enjoyed in my lifetime–but the business was done for. There was no way the nephew could recover the business in a neighborhood that had been hit by a destructive urban engineering plan. So goes the city with Paesanos.

They closed for good, as did many of the businesses at the intersection.

In 2012, the intersection of Auburn and Main became the site for new construction of a round-about. Every business on the east side of the Main Street corridor where Paesanos and the North Main Tavern, along with the old Jungle Jims, was demolished. And so it was completed in 2013. The 15 year plan to destroy the most amazing pizza I’ve ever eaten was replaced initially by corrupt urban engineering and completed by a round-about.

Eat my dick, Rockford. I will never forget that pan pizza from Paesanos. Every time I listen to Jonathan Wilson’s “Fanfare,” I long for an over-cooked pepperoni pan pizza.

Neko Case –The Worse Things Get, The Harder I Fight, The Harder I Fight, The More I Love You

Califone – Stitches

Foxygen – We Are the 21st Century Ambassadors of Peace & Magic

Handsome Family – Wilderness

Josh Berwanger – Strange Stains

Cass McCombs – Big Wheel and Others

Mikal Cronin – MCII

Bonnie Prince Billy & Dawn McCarthy – What the Brothers Sang

Vampire Weekend – Modern Vampires of The City

Caitlin Rose – The Stand-In

My God The Heat – Beautiful Men in an Ugly Town

Robbie Fulks – Gone Away Backward

Johnathan Rice – Good Graces

Yo La Tengo – Fade

Son Volt – Honky Tonk

Eminem – Marshall Mathers 2

Anna Calvi – One Breath

Bonnie Prince Billy – Self-Titled

Best Eps of 2013

Trevor Menear – Stars and Furr

La Historia – Awake Enough

Super Super – Live in the City

Best Frozen Pizza of 2013:

Kanye West – Yeezus: What a frozen pizza. Wow. It’s not groundbreaking as many critics, including the artist himself, would like to proclaim but it’s an entertaining and awfully cold listen considering the messenger.

West combines techno/industrial/house music with 80s hair metal influenced lyrics. (If that’s what qualifies for genius categorization in 2013, so be it.) He’s a god, he likes pussy, he needs drugs or doesn’t to party, he loves pussy, he hates whitey and himself equally, but loves himself enough to be the other son of God, “Yeezus,” and whatever. It’s a hilarious record and no different than anything Motley Crüe put out at their very best.

Kanye West is slowly becoming Vince Neil with cooler digital toys, but they both love porno stars or are married to them and each had/has a partying problem, Neil doesn’t like whitey in a suit and neither does Yeye. Glossy, messy, self-indulgent, and hilarious, “Yeezus” is one of the funniest records of 2013.

The fact that so many critics and fans alike praise this sort of shitty-assed frozen pizza is what becomes stranger and funnier after a few flat-assed-repeat listens. Yeezus offers nothing but a few empty dicks in your ear. This record is all boners, ego, and loaded with bonkers, folks.